Sombrero Beach

Just a short dinghy ride away from Boot Key Harbor in Marathon is Sombrero Beach and Park. The waters are nice, the beaches are sandy and it is on the leeward side, which provides protection from the strong winds. It is also near a reef that you can go to snorkel and they have mooring balls that you can tie up your small vessel while you are diving. I have yet to visit the reef, but I plan to make a trip out there one day before leaving Marathon. If for no other reason than to compare it with our snorkel experience in Key West at the 9 ft. reef, which was not good at all. We went to the beach yesterday when the weather was kinda cool, but they had a sand sculpture contest on the beach. Jessica & Gia were participating in the contest and I helped them finish it. It was fun as I can't recall when I ever made a sand castle or sculpture due to the very little time I spent at the beach while I was growing up. Usually I read, people watch, go in the water, or just look at the water and the things in and around it (birds & boats) while I am at the beach. I came to this beach before when the weather was much warmer and I found the water to be quite cool so I could only get in the water up to my thighs at the most. Even still it is nice to go chill out at the beach. The beach is nice because it is right next to a park with a couple volleyball courts, a play ground, and etc. Sometimes they have organized events like the Sand Sculpture contest and Volleyball tournaments, which is nice.

It's a Merry Christmas in Marathon

The City of Marathon Marina dock master, Richard, hosted a potluck Christmas lunch (1-4pm) for everyone staying in the harbor. JR & I made Spanish Tortillas to share with everyone. We prepared and cooked the tortillas for 2 hours. We enjoyed all the tasty foods that people brought to the buffet style table and at one point we had to really struggle to find space to put out all the food. The line was so long it spanned the entire perimeter of the common room and snaked outside, which many people were still seating waiting for the line to die down. I decided to lend a hand by cutting some pies and I was in the last group of people to get food as the line seemed to never end. There was still plenty of food remaining by the time we got to the tables and we filled up our plates with various types of delicious foods. I have to say that the turkey breast was the juiciest I had ever eaten and I wonder how they cooked it to such perfection. I suspect a syringe may have been involved to inject the bird with a broth of some sort. I think there were over 170 people attending the luncheon and I was surprised we all fit inside with a group of people out at the tiki hut. It was nice even with such a large crowd to meet and talk to different people you don't normally see around the marina. We were thoroughly stuffed from our meal and we returned to our boat to rest and digest. Then we returned to shore to enjoy the music played by a small group at the tiki hut and to chat with friends along with a few new people. We started the day cloudy and had a couple hours of rain, but by 1pm it was sunny and warm. The day turned out to be very nice with pleasant weather and company. I couldn't ask for much more, well I could ask for one thing and that would be to have my family. However, this is the life of a traveler. I don't know how long my trip will last, so I must savor the time and experiences I have when I have them. I know I am truly lucky to be able to do what I am doing right now.

Marathon Restaurant Reviews

I haven't eaten out too much in Marathon, but I can give reviews for the places I have tried. Pizza Hut is the standard fare out here and they have lunch buffet everyday from 11:30am-1:30pm, but don't expect them to be on time everyday as sometimes they run on island time. I think we ended up eating a little before noon when we ate there for lunch. We ate at Castaways, which has no true identity with a sushi bar and a sports bar atmosphere. I ate their wings and it is not worth it, while their burgers are more tasty. I hear they have good sweet potato fries, but I didn't eat them so I can't really critique them. I thought the place was over priced and in a bad location (behind a trailer park). I didn't find any reason to return for a second meal. We also got burgers at Burdines, which has reasonable prices. I got a tasty chicken burger with spinach, tomato and feta cheese for $9, but it didn't come with any sides so we ordered a basket of fries ($4) containing enough for four people. They are known for their burgers at Burdines. We ordered the Fried Key Lime Pie and didn't think too much of it because we don't really like the tartness of key lime pie. Keys Fisheries Market & Marina was a great place to get cheap stone crab claws ($1/claw) from 3-9pm during the stone crab season (Oct. 15- May 15). I should note that you have to go to the saloon upstairs at the bar to get the crab claw deal and be aware that they do run out sometimes because they sell to buyers from Miami and surrounding areas. If I were you I would call ahead and make sure they still have the $1 crab claw before heading out there, unless you want to get other food. The bar also has a deal on tuna sashimi ($3) and shrimp or something else for a good deal. I should also mention that if you see a board with specials for food and drink it only applies downstairs and you will have to stand in line to order those items. While you are standing in line to order your food you will probably see a school of tarpon or some other big fish that are swimming around waiting for people to feed them. I believe the marina has fish food available as you aren't supposed to throw in your leftovers. The Hurricane Grille has good and cheap wings (25 cents per wing) on Thursdays. Try the Trashcan flavor, which is a combination of all their sauces, as it is surprisingly good despite the name. I would recommend going earlier to beat the crowds because it seems that all of Marathon comes out for Wing night. Another find in Marathon, is a Thai & Sushi place next to Upper Crust Pizza and across from the community park. I was pleasantly surprised with the Chicken Pad Thai ($11) and the Vegetable Massaman Curry ($10). I was skeptical at first with the quality of the food because of its location, but my palate was satisfied with the tastes the kitchen offered. I will go back when I have a craving for Thai food, but I can't comment on their sushi as we didn't try any. I must include McDonald's, which has the same 49 cent hamburgers and 59 cent cheese burgers on Wednesdays deal. The $1 parfait is tasty, but small and they don't have two for $1 hash browns for breakfast (you only get one for $1). I don't usually eat at McDonald's but I thought I would also point out they charge 10 cents for water and their drink machines are behind the counter so you have to get someone to give you a refill. It was interesting that they had their sweet & sour and BBQ sauces in pumps instead of the packages. I like the decorations for this McDonald's with its island theme. The food is pretty standard as it is a McDonald's franchise, nothing special.

Marathon Marine Life

I have enjoyed seeing the various marine creatures in the Boot Key Harbor of Marathon. I have seen one manatee (although other people around me have seen more, but I missed them), some spotted eagle rays (photo from ) swimming around and many brown jellyfish that I can't seem to identify. There are also some feather duster worms and zebra mussels growing on the floating docks. Many fish that I will probably never identify swim all over the harbor, including a tarpon (identified by someone else) that chases a school of some kind of silver fish which looks like a wave from the ocean when the school jumps out of the water to get away from the bigger fish. I always enjoy seeing the marine life in their natural environment. I look forward to see more, but I doubt I will see anything different than what I have already seen. Well, a few days later we were riding in our dinghy at night to return to the boat and we had to stop to refuel. As we were doing so, a baby swordfish jumped into our boat and flapped around the bottom. It was our first experience of a marine animal boarding our boat and we were definitely surprised. JR carefully put it back in the water because even though it was a small swordfish we didn't want to get hurt from it's "sword". We weren't sure how sharp it was and we didn't want to find out. I hear that it is pretty common for fish and some other marine animals to jump into your boat so this occurrence is not unheard of. Some stories I heard had sad endings with deaths from a sting rays barb through the heart, but I mean what are the chances of that happening?

Manatee Encounter in Marathon

I saw the first manatee in the marina and I got to pet it, feed it some water, a stalk of celery, and give it a scrub to get the algae and other growth on his back. At first I thought the manatee had big scratches on its back, but I found out it was just where it scratched the algae off itself by rubbing against the docks and dinghies parked there. This was the coolest experience with the manatee even though I was getting eaten alive by the no-see-ums and mosquitoes. Then a guy walked by telling us it was illegal by federal law to touch and feed the manatee because it was an endangered species. He said feeding it water was bad for them because they would get full off the fresh water and not get the nutrients they need from the vegetation they normally consume. Also the guy said the algae that was on their backs supposedly "keeps the bugs off of them." I don't know what bugs he was referring to, but I decided to learn more about manatees. I enjoyed the time I had with the manatee and I hope I didn't do it any harm as it was not my intention. I found online some rules and regulations regarding the manatees. "Manatees are protected under federal law by the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 and the Endangered Species Act of 1973, which make it illegal to harass, hunt, capture or kill any marine mammal. Manatees are also protected by the Florida Manatee Sanctuary Act of 1978. Anyone convicted of violating this state law faces a possible maximum fine of $500.00 and/or imprisonment for up to 60 days. Conviction on the federal level is punishable by a fine of up to $50,000 and/or one year in prison. Feeding manatees, giving them water, or otherwise altering their natural behavior can be considered harassment." (http://www.homesafe.com/features/manatee/rules-of-the-road.php) To refute the statements made by a few people, I found that the reason you should not feed or provide water to the manatees is due to the association they make with humans and food or water and that will endanger the manatees because there are people who will harm them and the manatees will learn to go near places that will endanger their well being. As far as the algae growth, I found nothing about so called "bugs" that the algae provides protection from on the manatees. The only thing that I found the algae could possibly benefit the manatee is by giving it sun protection.

Now that I have been informed about manatees and have had my manatee encounter, I will enjoy the gentle giants as they turn up and I will at the most watch and photograph them. It is sad that so many manatees are being killed by power boaters and from fishermen improperly disposing of mono filament line and netting. This year (2009) has hit a record high in manatee death in Florida. The manatee deaths can be reduced with a change in human behavior, which I believe can be done with enough education and enforcement for boaters and fishermen. I hope to see more of the manatees in the future as they have been quite elusive to me.

Marathon- Week 1

I have stayed in Boot Key (city of Marathon in Florida Keys) for a week and I have enjoyed the events at the marina and the community as well as the Dolphin Research Center in Grassy Key. I really enjoyed watching the dolphins swimming and doing tricks at the Dolphin Research Center. I learned that dolphins people watch by turning their bodies to one side and staying still so they can look with one eye up at the people visiting. I learned that dolphins and porpoises are not even the same species so you can't use their names interchangeably. I got to see a cute baby dolphin swimming around with its mother in a separate area. I found it very difficult to take pictures of the dolphins when they are swimming and doing tricks, so instead I took videos of them to be able to capture their actions. An interesting tidbit is that they filmed Flipper here at the research center and some other dolphins were trained along with the star of the show to perform the tricks. It is important to note that the dolphins can leave at anytime because the nets that separate the areas are very low so they could jump out if they wanted, but they don't leave because they are domesticated and aren't trained to survive in the wild ocean. Often times the dolphins were rescued and brought to the research center so they could be nursed back to health and some of them are pregnant and have their babies at the research center, which is how dolphins come to be domesticated at the center. There were other animals including sea lions, various types of birds in cages, and wild chickens & peacocks walking freely. There is a small area with a man-made waterfall and plants to sit and enjoy the weather or scenery. The research center wasn't big, but you could spend 1-2 hrs watching the dolphins. When I watched the dolphins doing their show, I saw a small group of people who paid to have an up close and personal interaction with the dolphins. It was pretty neat to watch them "ride" on the dolphins.
I watched my first boat parade, which was neat with the boats decorated with Christmas lights and other decorations to see and hear at night. Some boats had used the lights to make neat designs like Christmas trees and some boats had people dressing up like Santa Claus and the last boat had a cannon that they shot powder out making a loud boom. We enjoyed watching the parade from our friends (GR & Jessica) boat and met a couple of their friends as well.
The following afternoon, the marina had an event just for the ladies called a Footcial (Pedicure) Party. It was nice to get together with the women in the marina to have a chance for girl talk, how they live on the boat, to conserve fresh water, and any other handy tips for the boat. I enjoyed the hot water foot soak while sipping on a cold beverage and even indulged myself by painting my toenails. :) I thought it was a nice free event that brought women together in such a male dominated area. It was a success and they decided to have another one next month.
I have been attending the free group yoga classes every morning (except Sunday) at the community park located next to the marina. They have a beginners and intermediate yoga class on alternating days, which is good to help with my flexibility and balance. The instructors are not certified so they just lead the sessions from what they know. I like the group workout because it is motivating when there is a set time and place to exercise. This is a good community for cruisers. People are friendly, there are things to do and places to go near the marina.

Madrid- The city that never sleeps

I took Madrid by storm during my week visiting the city. I went to every museum, sight, attraction, or places of interest that I wanted to see within the week and I even had extra time to add in more places I didn't originally intend to visit. I enjoyed the architecture of the buildings around the city and was able to see them as I walked all over the city. I also didn't use the very extensive metro until my last day there only to get to the train station to leave. I walked everywhere I needed to go so I planned my day the night before and then my path in the morning before leaving the hotel. I had a strategy of traveling by knowing which streets to take before I began walking so I wouldn't need to look at my map much, if at all, while I was on my way to my next destination. It helped to allow me to get to my destination faster without having to stop and look at the map and figure out where I am and where I need to go. I found out that many times the street names weren't posted or there were multiple signs posted so I wasn't sure which was the name of the street, which resulted in me getting lost or turned around and I had to then refer to my trusty map and determine where to go next. I would speed walk everywhere because of the crowded streets and people just wandering around aimlessly due to the huge number of tourists in the city. There were so many tourists in the city I had a hard time determining who was a local. I really liked El Corte Ingles because the store had everything from books to prepaid cell phones to clothes to groceries (the stores are separated by categories in Madrid because they are so big). I went to El Corte Ingles on a regular basis because it is like Wal-mart in the U.S. I found the city to be very busy both day and night, but I am not a night owl nor am I into dance clubs anymore so I didn't do any all-nighters or bar hopping until the wee hours of the morning as many younger travelers & locals do. I would wake up, eat breakfast and begin my day of sight-seeing from around 10am to 7pm. I would either find a nearby restaurant to get lunch or return to the hotel to eat something I picked up from El Corte Ingles. Then I would return to the hotel after my long day of exploring the city and rest or nap before dinner time. Then I would venture out again to try to locate the place I decided to eat at for dinner. I carried the Lonely Planet travel book for Madrid all the time because they had good maps and information to help me decide where I wanted to visit and eat. Unfortunately, it would have some incorrect information and I would have to find some other place to eat or visit due to the inability to find the places or closures; respectively. I experienced both good and not so good food in Madrid so just like any other place in the world you have to know what to order as well as where to go eat. My favorite dishes and places to eat in Madrid are the roasted suckling pig at Restaurant Botin (the oldest restaurant in the world- founded in 1725), gambas a la plancha & al ajillo (shrimp pan fried & with garlic) at La Casa del Abuelo, bacalao (cod) croquettes at Casa Labra, and the pumpkin & leek soup at La Gloria de Montera. I am sure there were other good places to eat, but I was always eating alone and I don't eat much so I had limited places I could eat at due to those constrictions along with being turned away due to no reservations or really long wait times to get a table or they didn't cook the dish I wanted at the time of day. My favorite art museum is the Thyssen-Bornemisza art museum because of my personal taste in art. I thought the art museums were like mazes because there were so many paths to take and I wasn't sure if I had visited all the rooms and seen all the works of art. I would have to back track sometimes and eventually I would have to decide that I had spent long enough time there and seen almost all the pieces. I would spend around 3 hours at each museum and my feet would be tired from all the standing and walking. My favorite attraction is the Palacio Real de Madrid (Royal Palace) because of the beautifully decorated rooms with the gold, marble statues, tapestries, paintings, and ornate ceilings that differed in every room. I also enjoyed the royal armory, which housed the weapons and armor the royal army and their horses used so many years ago. My favorite park is the Parque del Buen Retiro because it is so large with plenty of places to sit and ride bikes, pretty fountains, and I liked the glass building (a work of art from the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia collection). My favorite view was from the Templo de Debod park of the Royal Palace & Cathedral along with the view of a town below. It was not just my favorite because I saw a bride and groom take pictures with that view as their background one of the times I visited the park. I thought the metro was quite extensive because as I walked to my destinations I would see a metro stop before too long and I would wonder why people wouldn't walk the distance as it wasn't very far. I think the longest trek I took was from Plaza del Sol to the Atocha train station, which only took me 25 minutes to walk there. I think that Madrid is different from the rest of the smaller Spanish cities because it is so busy with businessmen and tourists. I found that many places of business stayed open even on holidays so people could get food and shop in Madrid, whereas other places everything would shut down so if you didn't get food the day before you were stuck with whatever you had or you didn't eat. I prepared ahead by purchasing some items from El Corte Ingles and was pleasantly surprised to find the city wasn't completely shut down for the holiday. I don't know much Spanish, but I was able to get around and even though many people said they didn't speak much English I was able to communicate enough to find my way and get what I needed. I knew the most essential phrases to get around and used the travel book and once the internet (it was more complex to talk with the people at the train station to tell them what train I wanted to take, what time, and where I wanted to go) to translate what I wanted to say. I enjoyed traveling in Madrid alone for the most part, but I would have liked to have someone to eat meals with me. :)

My first day in Madrid

I flew from Atlanta to Madrid with a connecting flight in Miami on Oct. 7th, 2009. It was my first time in Spain and I was ready to travel. It was a trip of many firsts for me as I was traveling alone for the first time in my life for the initial part of my trip. I had to find my way to the Petit Palace Londres hotel in the center of the city after a taxi ride that dropped me off at the wrong hotel. Fortunately, I wasn't very far away from the correct hotel and I was able to wander onto the correct street with the vague directions the receptionist had given me from the hotel I was dropped off. As I was about to ask for directions again until I found the door to enter the hotel and that was going to be my home for the week. I checked in and settled into my room within 30 min., but it was a long trip to get to this city! It took 2 hours to get from Atlanta to Miami, but there was a 3 hour delay along with a 4 hour layover in Miami. I didn't get on the plane to Madrid until 8:30pm and we flew to Madrid by 11am the next day. I was really exhausted from just getting there and I didn't sleep at all on the flight so I was quite tired. I decided just to lay on the big comfy bed and sleep to get the much needed rest to have energy to travel. Nothing goes as planned because I laid there for an hour at least and couldn't fall asleep. I was getting restless in the hotel room, so I just decided to begin my travels immediately and not waste any more time. I was very ambitious with walking to the Prado Museum for 3 hours to see every piece of art I could before they closed and then I walked over to the Parque Buen Retiro because it was not very far from the museum. I didn't get far into the park only reaching the double stairwell fountain because my feet were tired from all the walking. I sat on a stone bench and took in my surroundings and people-watched for a little while. Then I decided to head back to the hotel before it got dark to rest before dinner as they eat late, no earlier than 9 pm. I finally was able to take a nap and I decided to get some tapas for dinner. I ended up getting some bacalao (cod) croquettes from Casa Labra, which were very good. However, I got my first taste of the tapas eating environment and I was not impressed to say the least. I found it was a very small bar that had way too many people jammed in trying to buy tapas or drinks (mainly beer). The place was so crowded it was hard to even find a place to stand without being in the way. The small tables were filled and I was reduced to eating off a ledge in the corner of the room standing with random people around me who were also just standing and eating next to each other. I decided this was not where I wanted to be and so I ate really fast, taking my last croquette in a napkin to eat on the walk back to my hotel. I didn't enjoy eating this way because it was so uncomfortable with the noise and lack of space. I returned to my hotel to enjoy a nice hot shower and I went to bed listening to the sounds of the people and cars that passed by below in the city that never sleeps.

Miami to Marathon

The day before we left Miami, I saw my first manatee up close at the marina. It was so cool to see it pop its head above the water to look at me while it was drinking water from the hose a man was using to wash a boat. Then it swam towards me, but I was rushing to leave so I couldn't stay to pet the manatee. :( We left Miami on Dec. 3rd, 2009 to motor-sail down to Marathon in the Florida Keys. It was a rough passage down even though we listened to the weather and we planned the best we could with the forecasts. The first night we anchored in Key Largo at Thursday Cove, which was a coincidence because it was actually Thursday. :) We were the only boat in the cove and it was nice with all the peace and quiet. We enjoyed no boat traffic rocking our boat and the serenity of gently lapping water against the hull with the scenery of a beautiful sunset behind mangrove trees. The only thing is the mosquitoes that were trying to get in when the sun was setting, which we were very lucky to have our mesh netting to keep them out. There was absolutely no wind at night so there was nothing holding the mosquitoes back from our boat. We traveled 50 miles in about 10 hours to get to Key Largo from Miami. The wind and current was against us the entire time. :( We couldn't use our sail at all and we ended up using 9 gallons of diesel! The next day we had rainy and cloudy weather, but the wind was good enough for us to put out our sails so that really helped with our fuel consumption with only 3 gallons. We traveled from Key Largo to Long Key Bight. We learned the hard way that the charts were wrong in the cove and we ended up grounding our boat for the first time. It was fine because we have fin keels, which kept us upright. We were stuck for only 2 hours because we grounded in the low tide and it was rising so we were able to move the boat to deeper waters before sunset and put down our anchor. We crossed under the Channel #5 Bridge to get to Long Key Bight and we were at the mouth of the cove, which led to Hawks Channel so we were getting a lot of rocking due to the winds shifting against the current at night. In the morning, we had to wait until 7:30am before we could leave just to make sure we could get out without grounding the boat again. We tried to use Hawks Channel to get to Marathon, but we were beating against the wind and the current and we found the waves were tossing us around too much for comfort. So after 40 minutes we turned around and went back to the bay to take the long way over to Marathon. It was supposed to be a short trip with 23 miles from Long Key to Boot Key, but it took us all day! We had the winds and currents against us again, but this time we ran into a couple heavy rain storms so that slowed us down. We also were slowed with all the crab traps that littered the waters in the ICW. We would always have one in our path so we couldn't use the auto pilot for very long. There were so many crab traps all over the waters that we felt we were in a mine field. The crab traps are bad because they have these floating balls with strong ropes attached, which could get caught in our propeller. We were lucky to not have any incidents with the number of traps out there. We were able to use the sails some of the time down to Marathon, which helped us move faster and save fuel. Unfortunately, when we got close to Marathon we found our engine was overheating and spitting out fuel from the exhaust. We had to slow our engine down and rely on our sail to move, but we had problems with the wind shifting so we had to sail very close to the wind. We were able to move to the City of Marathon Marina and get to a mooring ball with the help of our friend, GR, pushing us close enough to the ball to tie a line because just as we were about to get close to a ball we were pushed back with a strong gust of wind. The engine was barely working to propel us forward so we just had it in idle. We were very relieved to get tied up to the mooring ball and relaxed immediately. We were able to enjoy the sunsets and sunrises much better on a mooring ball than when we are anchored out. :) It is really beautiful. I always love to watch the colors of the sky change as the sun appears and disappears from the horizon. Then we got settled in and ended up meeting a group of people near the tiki hut and ordered some pizza for dinner. It was fun to listen to them sing and play their guitars. I like the community feeling here and the marina has good facilities (hot water) for showers in a concrete- cinder block room and a large room with tv's, a library area, tables to sit and use the free wi-fi and recharge your laptops. They even have free weekly pump-outs where they come to your boat. Many places are within biking or even walking distance such as West Marine, Home Depot, Publix, K-mart, a public library, a big public park with basketball & tennis courts and a baseball & soccer field and a few restaurants nearby. But one thing they charge for is water at 5 cents a gallon so that is different from every other place we have been. The laundry business is also not as convenient because they require a card you have to put money on to be able to wash ($2) and dry ($1), which can only be done when the office is open. But other than that, we think this marina is really good and cater to cruisers. :) I also found out about a free group yoga class they have at the park so I am excited to take up yoga again.